MADRID — Unlike their Catalan cousins, most Basque nationalists have set aside their independence ambitions and are pushing for calm and cooperation.

Voters in the Basque Country go to the polls Sunday for regional elections against a backdrop of peace: The terrorist group ETA halted its armed operations five years ago, support for independence has slumped to low levels unseen since the 1980s, and even some old separatists now have their eyes on new goals.

“We are a nation, although we understand that being a nation nowadays in Europe doesn’t necessarily mean having a state,” said Andoni Ortuzar, president of the Basque Nationalist Party (PNV), which is highly likely to come out on top in Sunday's poll.

“I’m pro-independence, my heart is pro-independence, and I would be ready to live a bit worse than I do now to achieve independence,” he said, but added that he doesn’t “have the right to ask others to make the same sacrifice, especially if there are people who don’t want it.”

That seems to be the case.

"I believe we all know that we need to calm down" — Andoni Ortuzar, PNV

That's a big difference from further east where polls show that 41.6 percent of the 7.5 million Catalans want an independent state this year, compared with only 14 percent in 2006, according to the Centre d'Estudis d'Opinió, a regional public institution.

“We’ve been an extraordinarily politicized society which has experienced politics in a very traumatic way because of terrorism,” said Ortuzar. “I believe we all know that we need to calm down, and we are all aware that it is not good to fuel debates that can rekindle social tensions.”

The PNV has won every regional election in the Basque Country since the 1980s and the current head of the regional government (a position known as the lehendakari) is Iñigo Urkullu — the PNV divides power between the party leader and its candidate to lead the government.

Opinion polls give the PNV a comfortable lead going into Sunday's ballot, which takes place at the same time as a vote in neighboring Galicia. The Center for Sociological Research has the PNV on course to win 38 percent of the vote, up from the 35 percent it won in 2012 elections.

Second place will be either EH Bildu — the former political arm of ETA — which is polling at 20 percent, or the far-left Podemos, polling at 19 percent. The Socialists are on course for 11 percent, with the Popular Party of acting Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy on 9 percent and the centrist Ciudadanos on just 2 percent.

If those predictions come to pass, Urkullu would be able to stay in power, probably with the support of the Socialists, the PNV's current coalition partner — and little would change on a national level.

Shaped by violence

Spain has been without a fully functioning government for the best part of a year after inconclusive elections in December and June. Rajoy has been trying to put together a coalition, without success, and a third election is on the cards, on December 25. Political experts thought that if the PNV needs support from Rajoy, then the acting PM could count on the PNV in turn to help break the impasse nationally.

That seems unlikely now but, no doubt to Rajoy's great relief, the Basque elections won’t create a new secessionist challenge for his caretaker government to worry about.

“The Basque Country is shaped by the decades of violence that we have lived through,” said Nagua Alba, the regional leader of Podemos, which won the last two general elections in the region. “Basque society reached a point where it said ‘that’s enough, we need to live together.’”

Terrorism claimed more than 800 lives over five bloody decades as ETA (Euskadi Ta Askatasuna) conducted a violent campaign of bombings, assassinations and kidnappings.

The PNV’s Ortuzar said another reason for the lack of independence fervor is the high level of autonomy from Madrid that the region enjoys.

“We’re probably the most similar thing to a state that there is in Europe without being a state,” he said. “There are many people that don’t need independence anymore.”

Income gap

Catalan pro-independence forces point at another difference between the two areas: money.

Both the Basque Country and Catalonia are relatively wealthy regions, with GDP per capita 31 percent and 19 percent, respectively, bigger than the average of the country. The unemployment rate is 12.5 percent in the Basque Country, 16 percent in Catalonia, and 20 percent in Spain as a whole.

The Basque system “has allowed us to go through the economic crisis relatively better than Catalonia” — José Miguel Santamaría, editor of newspaper El Correo

However, the Basque Country enjoys financial privileges, while Catalonia follows the general system used by most regions. As a result, public expenditure in the Basque Country per capita in 2013 was over €4,000 and just under €2,000 in Catalonia, according to a 2016 report by the central government. The Spanish average was slightly over €2,000.

The Basque system “has allowed us to go through the economic crisis relatively better than Catalonia,” said José Miguel Santamaría, the editor of El Correo, the biggest-selling newspaper in the Basque Country.

Santamaría has another theory for the lack of support for secession — the PNV's dramatic change of direction after the failure of its plan to reshape the relationship between the Basque Country and Madrid, known as 'the Ibarretxe plan.'

Juan José Ibarretxe, lehendakari from 1999 to 2009, drew up a controversial reform to the state constitution that was rejected by Madrid in 2005. Although it wasn't a roadmap for independence, it defended the right to self-determination of the Basque people and many believed it would pave the way for independence at a later date.

As a result, the PNV lost its grip on power for the first time, despite coming first, and a PP-Socialist coalition secured a majority in the regional parliament.

The PNV "falls down" when it takes a more radical line, said Santamaría, adding that its current stance appeals to traditional center-left and center-right voters.

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Artur Sixto

It is not that PNV fell in polls after the Ibarretxe Plan attempt. What happened is that Spain illegalized Euskal Herritarrok (today Bildu), which you define, and Spain decided to define, as the political arm of ETA, like Sinn Fein relative to the IRA. Spain actually decided to regard EH and other political organizations and even the only Basque-language newspaper as part of ETA. With EH suddenly excluded from the elections, Basque nationalism, in spite of socially hegemonic, lost parliamentary hegemony to the Spanish nationalists of PSE-PSOE and PP. This can not happen again because today, after ETA stopped its armed struggle, Bildu (successor to EH) can take part again in elections and has come second only to EAJ-PNV.

The Basques cherish the peace they enjoy since ETA ceased its armed struggle a few years ago. They were very worn out by decades of fear and tension, of threats, bombings, police state, torture and bloodshed. Now that it is over, they are in no hurry to run into trouble again since they enjoy fiscal sovereignty and a high degree of political autonomy. But socially and culturally Basques remain strongly a distinct nation always ready to go its own way completely, as an independent country.

Spain made the mistake to regard ETA’s end of hostilities as a crushing triumph of both the police state and banning from politics the Basque “Sinn Fein”. Spanish nationalist euphoria has been a mistake about defeating both ETA and, humiliatingly, the Ibarretxe Plan of EAJ-PNV. Spanish nationalists at both PP and PSOE were emboldened by their “success” over the Basques. As a result, they felt they could impose on Catalonia whatever they wanted without bothering to negotiate fair deals. Without bothering to even have any real dialogue. They felt there was nothing to fear from “tame” Catalonia, because Catalans were never bent on armed struggle. They chose to ignore that Catalonia had long been mistreated and thought they could afford to be even more mean to Catalonia now that the Basques were being pacified. That was a huge mistake.

In 2005, contrary to the audacious Ibarretxe Plan, Catalonia was still betting on a conventional statute of autonomy solution. But Catalonia was already fed up and regarded the new, upgraded statute of autonomy, as a its last attempt of understanding with Spain. What happened was a tragic mistake by Spain. Both PSOE and PP manoeuvered to have the new statute of autonomy basically castrated by the Constitutional Court, after it had already been watered down by the Spanish parliament and yet half-heartedly approved in a referendum by Catalans. The sentence was horrific in its legal and also political nature, and slammed the door on any interpretation of the Constitution still possible until then, to further real political autonomy for Catalonia. It meant Catalonia became politically and financially enslaved to Spain without any hope of change. That elated Spanish nationalists, short-sighted and overconfident as they were, both at PP and PSOE. But that humiliated Catalans irreversibly and inflamed the Catalan will of sovereignty. It triggered a massive grassroots movement for independence. A movement unlike anything else in the western world, with 1-2 million people demonstrating for independence out of 7.6 in total, for 5 years in a row. Imagine a fifth of a country’s total population marching the streets every year: that is exactly what is happening in Catalonia. And people have been voting massively for pro-independence parties committed to put in practice our right to self-determination.

Spain should have reacted to that acknowleding its mistake, its wrongdoing, and offering real dialogue to Catalonia, to seek ways out of the constitutional crisis. Ways to grant Catalonia at least partial solutions to its grievances, ways to get around the Constitutional Court sentence by changing the Constitution where need be. That was feasible but never even considered. PSOE did offer an unsincere constitutional reform that would lead to a cosmetic federalization, fully knowing on the other hand, that even such a cosmetic “solution” would never happen, given the absolute opposition of PP. In other words, Spanish nationalists were either determined to enforce their “victory” over Catalonia (PP), or pleased to offer “solutions” both false and unworkable (PSOE).

This means Spanish nationalists have basically gone so far against Catalonia as to screw things up completely and irreversibly. They mistreated Catalonia over the last four decades, very badly, when Catalonia was desperate to live a normal situation after four decades of fascist, genocidal dictatorship. They humiliated Catalonia when Catalans sought a new deal with Spain. After that, rather than acknowleding any mistake and wrondoing when Catalan separatism was inflamed, they chose to play down the democratic grassroots revolution that has brought Catalonia to the brink of secession.

Spain is dealing with the problem by denying its nature and sabotaging Catalan politics and economy worse than ever. Catalonia is seceding while Spain is in denial.